Somewhere
on a remote island in the South Atlantic, Sea Monkeys have grown to full
man-size and they like to attack in waves (we’re thinking of how they were
portrayed in the old comic book ads, not the actual wisps of algae that they
were). Alas, an Irish meteorological officer will barely survive this discovery.
Reluctantly, he teams up with the world’s grumpiest lighthouse keeper to fend
off the hordes of sea humanoids, while simultaneously doubting his own humanity
in Xavier Gens’ Cold Skin (trailer here), which opens today
in Los Angeles.
The
kindly captain dropping “Friend” (symbolic name alert) off on this forsaken
rock is a bit alarmed by the trashed condition of his cabin. Then they get a
loud of the drunk and disheveled lightkeeper, Gruner. His vague
non-explanations for the absence of Friend’s predecessor should have been the
last straw, but he stays on any way. He barely survives the Sea Monkeys’
welcoming reception, but the shack does not.
Reluctantly,
Gruner takes him in at the lighthouse, only because he has generous supplies of
ammo, booze, and tobacco. They do not get along very well, but almost every
night they still fight off the creatures, shoulder to shoulder. Friend is
particularly appalled to find Gruner keeping a female creature to satisfy his carnal
cravings, but it is handy to have the advance warnings she provides ahead of
each attack.
Skin is a ridiculously
heavy-handed film that wants to make us question what it means to be human. Not
to belabor the obvious, but this bit of recycled commentary would be a tad more
convincing if Friend and Gruner did not have to fight so desperately to
survive. Still, the business with the creature Friend dubs Aneris is absolutely
appalling, no question about that.
Regardless,
this all has a very been-there-done-that vibe to it. Maybe the timing is just
unlucky for Skin, because it arrives
after the first season of AMC’s The Terror and The Lighthouse, which
is not even a horror film per se, but whatever it is, it is superior to Gens’
film.
David
Oakes is not bad as Friend, but it often looks like the ordinarily reliable Ray
Stevenson is just shouting a lot to try to cover-up the wafer thinness of his
character. However, the creatures themselves are unforgivably dull. Arguably,
they have less personality than the rats in the Vincent Price radio drama, Three Skeleton Key. Altogether, that
makes it dashed difficult to care about anything that happens in Cold Skin.
